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\centerline{\bf Foreword}
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The present book is an attempt to write a new kind of biography; not only
the biography of a mathematician, necessarily including an extensive if
non-technical discussion of his mathematical work above and beyond the
facts of his personal life, but an attempt to portray the individual 
{\it in } the mathematics as well as the individual behind the mathematics,
as one and the same individual.  Grothendieck is not just one of a select
group of the greatest mathematicians of all time; he is perhaps the one
amongst all of them in which personality is most strongly revealed in
the mathematical work.  This observation may be surprising to one acquainted 
only with the published mathematical writings of Grothendieck, and may
be treated with scepticism by those who believe scientific results are
pure of all trace of the human input that produced them.  A biography alone
would be easy enough to write; a mathematical biography more difficult,
but the present endeavor may be qualified as positively risky, carrying a
real possibility of failure.  Yet the material is so rich and so convincing
that the project seems to be worth the effort.

It is obviously impossible to write a biographical account of 
Alexander Grothendieck's life during the crucial ``professional'' period
1948-1970, without devoting a large part of the text to the mathematical
considerations which formed his greatest concern.  Since the book is
intended to be accessible to any sort of public, this necessity is somewhat
of a challenge; one which we have chosen to confront on the one hand by 
extensive recourse to Grothendieck's own fascinating writings on the subject 
of mathematical research and creativity, and by keeping the strictly 
mathematical discussion on a reasonably informal level, communicating only the 
main thrust of Grothendieck's accomplishments and unique style, and on the
other, by the edition and publication of a separate volume, which can be
read as an entirely independent work, but which is some sense will also
be a companion volume to the biography.  This other volume will contain a 
much deeper exploration of Grothendieck's mathematical work, in the 
form of contributions written separately by a number of mathematicians who 
actually witnessed the development of the themes they write about, and for the 
most part also actively participated in them. 

It also seems wise to avoid a strictly chronological progression in recounting
Groth\-endieck's life over the twenty-year period that made him into one of
the most extraordinary and influential mathematicians the world has ever known.
There are topics which deserve a chapter in themselves, and which have
no particular location in time.  For all of the chapters, whether devoted to
actual events, to mathematical discoveries, to Bourbaki, to Grothendieck's
family life, or to his colleagues and students, the major sources are 
public documents, Grothendieck's own writings, and finally, the 
indispensable and fascinating words and memories of those who knew him well
and who were willing to talk about him in detail and at length: his former
students Michel Demazure, Luc Illusie, Jean Malgoire, Michel Raynaud,
his colleagues Pierre Cartier, Jacques Dixmier, Roger Godement, 
Robin Hartshorne, Max Karoubi, Steve Kleiman, Bill Messing, Jaap Murre, 
Claudine Schwartz, Jean-Pierre Serre, and his friends and children from 
outside the world of mathematics.  

My warmest thanks go to all those who have taken or will take the time to help 
this project reach fruition.
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\centerline{\bf Proposed Articles for the Independent Volume}
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\noindent {\bf Existing texts}
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Max Karoubi 

{\it L'influence d'Alexandre Grothendieck en $K$-th\'eorie alg\'ebrique
et en $K$-th\'eorie topologique}
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Michel Raynaud 

{\it Grothendieck et la th\'eorie des sch\'emas}
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David Mumford 

{\it My introduction to schemes and functors}
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Luc Illusie 

{\it Grothendieck et la cohomologie \'etale}
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William Messing 

{\it Manuscript written but not available yet: crystalline cohomology}
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Pierre Cartier

{\it A country of which only the name is known: Grothendieck and ``motives''}
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\noindent {\bf Proposed texts}
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Alexander Pelczynski (functional analysis)
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Jaap Murre  (fundamental groups)
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Steve Kleiman (Picard schemes)
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Robin Hartshorne (residues and duality)
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Jean B\'enabou (topos theory)
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Yves Andr\'e (motives)
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Carlos Simpson (descent)


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Christian Houzel (Cartan seminar?)

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Frans Oort (origins of Grothendieck's ideas?)
%
%Invited authors, not yet answered
%Artin, Tate



%(Creativity, early years, students, Americans, children, Bourbaki, departure from the IHES)
\bye
